


Promised

by glim



Category: Merlin (BBC)
Genre: Episode Tag, First Kiss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-10
Updated: 2010-08-10
Packaged: 2017-10-11 01:05:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/106584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glim/pseuds/glim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>In Arthur's dream, they are back in Ealdor, and they sleep together as they sleep on the forest floor, bodies curled around each other in a nest of shared heat, beneath a pile of thin blankets.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Promised

The evening is clear and cool when they stop halfway between Ealdor and Camelot, the grass damp and dark with the falling dew. Arthur volunteers for the first watch, bickers with Morgana over it for a few minutes, and yields when she catches him pinching the bridge of his nose.

Exhaustion and headache catch up with him all at once, and though the ground is colder and harder than the floor he slept on in Ealdor, Arthur feels the dullness of sleep tug at his senses as soon as he lies down.

Merlin lies down next to him, but tonight his body presses up against Arthur's, his chest to Arthur's back, solid and safe, one knee locked between Arthur's and his arm heavy at Arthur's waist, a secure weight.

For warmth, Arthur thinks, aware of the quiet rush of blood and breath between them, and slides his hand down to rest atop Merlin's. A sigh gusts through his hair and Merlin mumbles a goodnight before he kisses Arthur. It's soft, lingering, and strangely comforting: the unexpected touch of Merlin's lips to his skin.

"Merlin?"

"Sleep," he says, his lips still warm against the side of Arthur's neck and his nose tucked in behind Arthur's ear. "M'really tired; so are you."

The stars pin-prick the night sky, their glimmering just visible at the edge of the forest's canopy, and Arthur measures time in steady, slow breaths against the back of his neck, oblivious to minutes or hours, until he falls asleep.

*

In Arthur's dream, they are back in Ealdor, and they sleep together as they sleep on the forest floor, bodies curled around each other in a nest of shared heat, beneath a pile of thin blankets.

Moonlight stripes silver-white through a half-curtained window into a room Arthur knows is theirs, his and Merlin's. He thinks of the stream at the edge of the field, where the water runs clear and cold, and how that stream and that field, the worn footpath that winds through the field and splashes down into the stream, are all theirs, too.

Behind him Merlin stirs, his hands and lips against Arthur's skin, pulling him down deeper into sleep and shaping his dream into one of hazy contentment. He lets himself be held, protected, owned for a moment.

There was a time, so long ago, when Arthur was the son of a powerful king, and all he could see was promised to be his someday. That life has melted into myth and become a memory he cannot grasp, a remnant of a time and place beyond his recognition.

Yet, this has not changed: everything Arthur sees is his, promised to him before he understood the meaning of possession.

Merlin snuffles against the back of his neck and Arthur cannot help the way fondness warms through his chest and presses him in closer to Merlin, so close that he can't and won't let himself surface from Merlin's embrace or from the dream he has of a life transposed.

*

"Did you sleep all right?"

"I… Yes." Arthur blinks up at Merlin, who's half-curled against his side, and shifts so Merlin settles against him more comfortably. "Morgana –"

"Still awake. She and Gwen…" Merlin's gaze skitters off somewhere into the dark.

"We should get up and take over the watch." To get Merlin to look back at him, Arthur touches his cheek.

Merlin nods, his face slack and soft with sleep against the palm of Arthur's hand. He's still pale with sorrow and fatigue, and Arthur imagines he can see the shadows under Merlin's eyes, can trace them with the edge of his thumb and feel the flutter of Merlin's eyelashes as he lowers his eyes against Arthur's touch.

"What about you? You slept?"

Merlin nods again, though Arthur can feel the slight tension in Merlin's body that tells him that Merlin hasn't slept well. His fingers slip into Merlin's hair as he tugs Merlin down and kisses him once, gently, and then again, not quite so gently, their lips a dry press and then a damp slide against each other. Merlin kisses him harder, more eagerly, and his breath comes heavy and unsteady against Arthur's mouth when he pulls away.

Smiling into the small space between them, Arthur kisses Merlin's bottom lip, his nose, his cheek, and closes his eyes when Merlin rests his forehead against Arthur's.

"When we get back to Camelot –"

" –I'll make sure you get some proper rest."

Arthur kisses Merlin again before they rise.


End file.
